February 18, 2014
01:00 PM (EST)

News Release Number: STScI-2014-11

Hubble Watches Stars' Clockwork Motion in Nearby Galaxy

February 18, 2014: Using the sharp-eyed NASA Hubble Space Telescope, astronomers have for the
first time precisely measured the rotation rate of a galaxy based on the clock-like
movement of its stars.

According to their analysis, the central part of the neighboring galaxy, called the
Large Magellanic Cloud (LMC), completes a rotation every 250 million years.
Coincidentally, it takes our Sun the same amount of time to complete a rotation
around the center of our Milky Way galaxy. The arrows in this photo illustration
represent the highest-quality Hubble measurements of the motion of the LMC's
stars to show how the galaxy rotates.